The Gender War (The Gender Game #4)(8)

Her eyebrows drew together into a frown. “Is he okay?” she asked, not questioning Owen’s role reversal at all, and I had to tamp down the surge of irrational jealousy that roared up in me. Violet liked Owen as a friend. They had been through the thick of things together. It was the only reason I had given him a pass. Well, that and the fact that he had been part of the team that had gotten the surgical equipment needed to save my life, so I owed him one. Well, two, if I counted the bomb he and Violet had defused at the facility.

I gritted my teeth together as I realized I was more indebted to Owen then I cared to admit. I was sure he was a nice enough guy, but I just didn’t like him.

“He’s fine,” I muttered. “And he seems to be willing to help us. I got him to try to get a message to Alejandro, so hopefully they are moving the boat farther upriver.”

Violet nodded and slowly steadied herself on her feet. “We need to move, Viggo,” she said, her voice still tremulous.

“Are you going to be okay?” I asked.

She straightened up, looking at her bandaged hand. “It’s my dominant hand, but it doesn’t matter. We just need to get out of here before we get caught. Let’s worry about my hand afterward.”

“Agreed,” I said, pulling the guard’s gun back out of my pants. We approached the door, and Violet reached out with her left hand and slowly cracked it open. I checked one side of the door as it opened, then stepped around the threshold to check the other side of the hallway. “Clear,” I announced, and Violet stepped out, closing the door behind us.

The guard I’d left crumpled in the hallway was still there, which was a good sign, but not guaranteed to keep any more of them from running down here and spotting us. I dragged her prone body inside the horrible interrogation room and tied her hands to the table, then looked for the nearest stairwell. All the way down, Owen had said. And we were pretty far up.

Violet had lost a lot of blood, given the pallor of her skin, but she didn’t complain as we walked down the halls. Still, I suddenly wished I’d found a first aid kit on this level—if only to get her a blood patch.

“Where are we going?” she whispered.

“Garage at the bottom of the palace—that’s where we’re all meeting up.”

She nodded and we kept looking for the stairs, but as we passed through the halls, I could see dark shadows haunting her eyes. My concern mounting, I couldn’t help but ask, “What is it?”

“This is where Lee killed Queen Rina and Mr. Jenks,” she whispered, as if the memory pained her more than her hand. I was about to say something sympathetic, but then she pointed. “Looks like stairs.”

We’d found our way down. At my nod, Violet slowly swung the doorway open, and I quickly swept the stairwell landing, grateful to find it empty. I started down the stairs, taking care to keep my footsteps light.

Down. All we had to do was go all the way down.





4





Violet





The sounds of our footsteps echoed down the empty stairwell. My hand throbbed in tempo with our steps, keeping the rhythm of my heartbeat. Everything felt wobbly.

A stray thought caught my mind as we went down, and I smiled. “‘Baby’?” I murmured to Viggo. “Since when do you call me ‘baby’?”

He turned back to stare at me for a pointed moment, then a smile, just the ghost of one, passed over his face. “Let’s keep on going, baby,” he said, as though he had to coax me. “We’re getting closer.”

I wasn’t sure why I was teasing Viggo about calling me baby. Or why I was even teasing him at all. Nothing about this situation was humorous. If we survived, I didn’t know how long it would be before I could use my dominant hand again.

And yet, it comforted me to tease him. It allowed me to cope with the situation around us, let me believe that we were getting out of it. I had to believe we would, because the alternative was too grim to think about.

“What’s the plan, exactly?” I asked, keeping my voice low as we crept down the stairs.

“From the garage? I’m not entirely sure,” Viggo replied. I felt a sudden surge of anxiety at his frankness, but I kept it to myself—now wasn’t the time or the place for a freak-out. “I figure we get a vehicle and head upriver to meet up with Alejandro and the others. Owen was trying to contact them, but I don’t know if he succeeded. From there… I don’t know. I suppose we need to get to Patrus and warn the king.”

I nodded. It made sense—King Maxen needed to know what was coming. The irony of it all, that it was just the same plan we’d originally had for Matrus, struck me, and my head throbbed. I wasn’t sure what Elena’s timeframe was, or even what her plan was. I knew that she was trying to manufacture a war with Patrus; maybe she was trying to make Patrus look like the aggressor.

The situation between Patrus and Matrus had always been tense, but we had lived in relative peace since the inception of our countries. Nothing like this had ever happened before, and I only hoped we could find a way to stop it before too many people were hurt.

Or killed.

“What’s wrong?” asked Viggo. I realized I had stopped in the middle of the steps.

“Nothing,” I muttered, pressing forward. “I guess… I guess I’m just worried about what’s going to happen to us. And to… to everyone. It seems like the harder we try, the more this problem just keeps getting bigger and bigger.”